


but your smile is a frown

by TrainRush



Series: Donut Hole AU [2]
Category: A Hat in Time (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Light Angst, Memory Loss, Mild Blood, Mild Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-24
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-15 19:06:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29688552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrainRush/pseuds/TrainRush
Summary: DAY 24: memory lossThe Conductor remembers something unexpected in the deepest room of the basement.—(or, alternatively, the Conductor recovers a memory from the day the stranger from his dreams disappeared.)
Series: Donut Hole AU [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2156415
Comments: 2
Kudos: 15





	but your smile is a frown

**Author's Note:**

> au synopsis:
> 
> _ The AU begins when Hat Kid is defeated by DJ Grooves in the final phase of the Battle of Award 42. Facing the crowd of onlooking moon penguins, he smashes the Time Piece… and promptly disappears from their universe, breaking his promise to win back all the awards. What he leaves behind is an extremely unstable Time Rift — the last thing keeping him tethered to their universe. No one knows where he went. Hat Kid slowly recovers from her injuries with the help of the Conductor, but she is not quick enough to stop the Time Rift from collapsing and dooming their universe. _
> 
> _ When the Time Rift collapses and their universe becomes void, Hat Kid and the Conductor both wake up in an alternate timeline in which DJ Grooves never existed. They do not remember anything of the timeline they left. This alternate universe is simply their reality, and they believe it always has been. _
> 
> _ However, a day or two after (unknowingly) waking up in this alternate timeline, large, blurry memories of the Conductor’s begin to resurface inexplicably. Common among them all is a single person, yet he can’t quite place who it is. Every attempt to piece together the puzzle pulls a blank — it’s almost as if there’s an empty hole everywhere they appear. He is only able to draw a single conclusion: there should be an extra bird in his studio, but he can’t quite prove they were ever there to begin with. _

The elevator doors slid open with a soft clanking sound and the Conductor stepped out into the hall.

The hallway was short, and it led into a large, expansive room. The room was the deepest one in the entire studio, and the Conductor often wondered why the studio even had such a room in the first place. He often considered clearing it out and using it for filming, but he figured that it was too much work for very little payoff. So he left it be, allowing the dust to build on the stacks of boxes that sat down there.

As the Conductor walked, carrying in his arms a small box that he had been delivering down to the room, he took in the layout of it. In the center, it dipped down about two feet; there were walkways on the sides of the room bordering it, making it quite unique. He’d always admired it for its odd structure. Again, though, he had no use for it, and it became a storage room just like every other room in the studio.

The Conductor approached a short stack of boxes and set the load he was carrying on top of it. He sighed, turning around to return to the elevator when he paused for a moment. Something felt oddly familiar about the place. It manifested as an odd itch at the back of his mind — something that only happened when he was about to receive another memory. Curiously, the Conductor walked forward a bit, keeping his gaze on the center of the room. He paused. Yes, something was  _ very  _ familiar about this. Even more familiar than other instances.

He cocked his head to the side—

In an instant, he was transported somewhere else. Somewhere both familiar and foreign to him at the exact same time. The room’s layout was just like the one he was currently in, except it had been renovated and turned into a nightclub of sorts. Birds that the Conductor couldn’t identify crowded around the center of the room, the raised land that bordered the drop having been turned into seating for an audience. Their cheering was deafening. And there the Conductor stood, on the sidelines of it all. But then his heart dropped.

In the center of the room, lying unconscious in the middle of the floor, was none other than Hat Kid. She was covered in scratch marks, and he could have sworn he saw blood in some areas.

He recalled rushing over to her, gently scooping her up in his arms and holding her in an attempt to assess her injuries. The dots connected in his mind that Hat Kid had been involved in some kind of fight. But why was she fighting?  _ Who  _ was she fighting? Who had the audacity to fight a  _ child?  _ Every time he searched for answers, his mind pulled a blank. As though those memories were locked behind a wall of some kind.

“Dear lord, what have you done?!” The Conductor exclaimed. He looked up, now, at the perpetrator of the attack: the same strange, erased figure he’d seen in all of his other memories. They seemed to narrow their eyes at him in blind fury.

“She has no future.” They reached somewhere and pulled out a gleaming hourglass, one of the same ones Hat Kid had been collecting. They stared at it instead of the Conductor. “And neither do you.”

The Conductor was appalled. “My future will always be-!”

“I am not speaking to you.” Their words were poisonous. The Conductor’s heart raced. Yet still, they continued staring at the hourglass.  _ Was that what they had fought over? The hourglass? _

He remembered what Hat Kid had told him.  _ The person who caused the anomaly must have either stolen them without her knowing or beaten her in battle. _ A chill went down his spine. Was this memory of…?

“You’re sick!” he screamed at the person. At this memory, the Conductor felt his heart drop. He’d had so many positive memories with this person. And now, this? 

“You don’t understand, Conductor.” They shook their head. “I’m doing this for the good of all of us. It had to be done.”

The Conductor couldn’t argue back now. He felt Hat Kid begin to stir in his arms. He released his grip on her a little bit, whispering to her to ask if she was okay. Hat Kid had nodded drowsily. 

The figure took a few steps back. They acknowledged the crowd with what the Conductor interpreted to be a grin. “Are we ready?” they called out. In response, the crowd went up in cheers. Their excitement could have sparked electricity in the air.

As much as the Conductor had wanted to get up and stop them, he knew he couldn’t. If they had bested Hat Kid —  _ Hat Kid, of all people  _ — in a fight? He knew that he wouldn’t even stand a chance against them. So as much as he wanted to tackle them, he stayed still, gawking in disbelief. They weren’t  _ really  _ going to do this, were they?

Hat Kid seemed to have fully come back from unconsciousness now. She shoved herself from the Conductor’s arms and attempted to steady herself. The Conductor tried to whisper to her, to tell her to back down. He tried to tell her not to waste her energy on this because she needed to recover. Hat Kid didn’t even seem to hear him. She stood her ground, umbrella held in both of her hands.

“So stubborn,” they said, shrugging. “Can’t you see? You’ve already lost.”

Hat Kid became furious. She charged, hitting the person with all her might. They seemed to recoil a little from this, but it was clear that the person damaged the most out of the two was Hat Kid. She huffed, attempting to catch her breath before falling backwards again. The person kneeled down to her, smiling in her face.

“I’m sorry, darling. But you need to go back to the Conductor now, okay?”

_ Darling.  _ For whatever reason, that word hit a strange note in the Conductor's mind. Perhaps it was because he’d heard it in so many of his other memories, too.

Hat Kid was horrified, but she seemed to understand now that she’d lost. She slowly raised herself up, slinking back to the Conductor and falling into his arms. The Conductor held her closely again, but didn’t take his gaze away from the person with the hourglass.

“Now,” they said, “let’s see just what this Time Piece is made of, huh?”

Again, the crowd erupted with applause.

They heaved the Time Piece up high into the air—

—their eyes landed on the Conductor, and they smiled—

—and the hourglass crashed into the ground with a great  _ crack. _

The memory seemed to cut short there. The Conductor hadn’t noticed until now that his heart was racing, and his breathing had gotten quicker than usual. He looked around the room again, this time with a much different lens. Now, everywhere he looked he noticed traces of the memory. Everything reminded him of that scene. 

At the same time, he was confused.  _ So  _ confused. First of all, why had the room been turned into a  _ nightclub,  _ of all things? He figured it must have been something to do with the missing bird, as he was positive he would have never built something like that in  _ this  _ universe. Secondly, how had it been the site of a showdown between Hat Kid and the person? And lastly, what had they meant when they said they were shattering the Time Piece ‘for the good of everyone?’ What good could changing the timeline possibly bring?

He shook his head.

All he knew was that he needed to get this information to Hat Kid.


End file.
